Prerequisites: Graduate students:IS 5800

Course Description:

Largely fostered by
the globalization, the Internet, processing standards, and common software
packages, organizations now regularly source business and information
technology (IT) services globally. This course covers topics to help managers source business and IT services from the initiation
of a sourcing decision and evaluation process through to service provider
selection and transition to outsourcing.The course also covers the client and provider capabilities and
contractual and relational governance that are needed to ensure good
outsourcing outcomes for both parties.The course focuses on global sourcing of IT, financial and accounting
services, human resource services, procurement, real estate services, legal
services, and other back office services. Students will also investigate
insourcing options such as shared services and captive centers and other
emerging sourcing topics such as impact sourcing, crowd sourcing, and rural
sourcing.

Dr. Mary Lacity is Curators’ Professor of Information Systems and
an International Business Fellow at the University of Missouri-St. Louis.She is also a Certified Outsourcing
Professional ®, Co-Chair of the IAOP Midwest
Chapter, Industry Advisor for the Outsourcing Angels, Associate
Researcher at The
Outsourcing Unit, London School of Economics, Co-editor of the Palgrave Series: Work, Technology,
and Globalization, and on the Editorial Boards for Journal of Information Technology, MIS
Quarterly Executive, Journal of Strategic Information Systems, and Strategic Outsourcing: An
International Journal. Her research focuses on global outsourcing
of business and IT services. She has conducted case studies and surveys of hundreds of
organizations on their outsourcing and management practices. She has given
executive seminars world-wide and has served as an expert witness for the US
Congress. She was the recipient of the 2008 Gateway to Innovation Award
sponsored by the IT Coalition, Society for
Information Management, and St. Louis RCGA and the 2000 World Outsourcing Achievement
Award sponsored by PricewaterhouseCoopers and Michael Corbett and Associates. She has published 14 books, most recently Advanced
Outsourcing Practice: Rethinking ITO, BPO, and Cloud Services (Palgrave, 2012; co-author Leslie
Willcocks). Her publications have appeared in the Harvard Business Review,
Sloan Management Review, MIS Quarterly, IEEE Computer, Communications
of the ACM, and many other academic and practitioner outlets. She was
Program Co-chair for ICIS 2010. Before earning her Ph.D. at the
University of Houston, she worked as a consultant for Technology Partners
International and as a systems analyst for Exxon Company, USA.

This
course is cross-listed in the Outsourcing Professional Course Catalog (OPCC)

This course is worth 25 of the 150
points required to become a Certified Outsourcing Professional (COP).

The International Association of Outsourcing
Professionals (IAOP) offers a number of certifications, including the
COP-Certified Outsourcing Professional.To become a Certified Outsourcing Professional (COP), an individual must
be able to demonstrate both the experience and knowledge needed to design,
implement, and manage outsourcing initiatives with a high probability of
achieving the organization's intended outcomes. The experience and knowledge
areas addressed by the certification cover the non-domain specific activities
common to outsourcing as a management practice irrespective of the individual's
role as a customer, provider, or advisor. In so doing, the certification
creates an experience and knowledge set common to and shared by all
professionals in the field.

What is the process for becoming a COP? Applicants will be asked to
successfully demonstrate that they possess the necessary knowledge and experience
to be considered a COP. This knowledge and experience can be demonstrated
through a combination of the following:

Comprehensive Work
Experience in the field of outsourcing as demonstrated by
employment on one or more projects across one or more firms.

Knowledge Assessment through passing the multiple choice COP
Examination developed by the Standards Committee. The exam is taken online and
consists of 200 multiple choice questions, of which 70% of the questions must
be answered correctly to pass.

Ideal
Student Profile:

Students
have different learning styles.This course is most suited for:

§students who enjoy self-directed learning

§students who are mature (accountable and responsible
for their own work)

§students who welcome the challenge of reading
advanced scholarship

§students who follow written instructions well

§students who do not mind listening to prerecorded
lectures

§students who are organized

§students who have the
self-discipline and time to spend on this course.

§students who enjoy working in groups

Professor
is be able to monitor a student’s daily progress, as professor can see
exactly when a student accessed module materials and how much time was spent spent on certain tasks (such as listening to
lectures).Of course some
students may choose to work heavily on the weekends and lightly during the work
week.Each student needs to make
good progress each week; each student should be fully prepared for exams.

Exams:

Students will take
three exams, but the lowest exam score will be dropped.If students are satisfied with their
first two exam scores, they do not have to take the third exam. Because students
may drop an exam, the final average is calculated using the following formula:

The exams will cover
material from the assigned readings and professor’s lectures.Exams are NOT cumulative.

The exams comprise multiple choice questions
and will be delivered online.Please
note, ONCE YOU OPEN THE MULTIPLE CHOICE EXAM YOU ONLY HAVE 3 HOURS TO COMPLETE
IT!

Do not open the test until after you have
read the required materials and you have studied.You may use your notes, readings, power
point slides to answer questions. You may not speak with other students
about the exam.

There are 50 multiple choice questions on
each exam.

No late exams will be accepted, thus plan
ahead!If the system crashed while
you are taking an exam, contact the professor immediately by email.

In this class, the
letter grades use the following scale:

92.00 or above

A

90.00 to 91.99

A-

88.00 to 89.99

B+

82.00 to 87.99

B

80.00 to 81.99

B-

78.00 to 79.99

C+

72.00 to 77.99

C

70.00 to 71.99

C-

Below 70.00

F

Class
Participation:

The class only meets face-to-face six times
so it is vital that students attend all six classes.Students should not miss any
classes.Students must attend allgroup
presentations on both allotted days in December or students will be required to
write essays on missed presentations in order to complete the class.

Oral
Group Presentation:

The class will be divided into eight groups.
Each group is responsible for presenting a 50 minute presentation to the class.
Each group will be assigned a different ITO/BPO topic:

Secondary Resources. Each
group should research at least 20
external references such as journal articles, newspapers, short videos, or
relevant websites.Some excellent
sources that cover the ITO and BPO markets are:

At least 10 of these references must be from refereed journals or academic journals for
practitioners, such as Sloan Management Review, Harvard Business Review,
Academy of Management Perspectives. Refereed
journals assure some level of validation.The academic articles don’t have to be limited to just your narrow
topic (such as Egypt), but can include academic articles on outsourcing in
general, surveys of outsourcing, theories or outsourcing, literature reviews on
outsourcing, etc.

The best source to find refereed journal
articles is ABI-INFORM, available online to UMSL students.To find refereed articles, simply tick
the box for “Scholarly journals,
including peer-reviewed ” while in ABI inform. Professor
will show you how to conduct a search if you need help.

Many students liven up their presentations by including short video
clips about their topic (such as a youtube video).

Primary Resources. Students should conduct at least two original
interviews for their group projects.

Another potential source of primary data is an
original survey.For example, a past
group surveyed 35 lawyers to see if they would outsource any legal work.Another group surveyed graduate
students to assess their level of participation in Crowdsourcing.

PRESENTATION TIMING:

Each group should only plan 40 minutes of content to allow
10 minutes of audience interaction duringthe presentation. Think
of yourselves not as formal speakers, but as teachers. You should incorporate
the audience during the entire presentation.In the past, students have done very creative
things for audience participation including a short Jeopardy game, a bingo
game, a short survey, a guess the provider logo game, etc.

PRESENTATION
MATERIALS:

Each group will develop power point slides.

On the day of your presentation, please provide a STAPLED, hardcopy set the slides for
your instructor.Please print only 2 slides per page.

Please load your final power point slides in GROUP X Group Pages under
FILE EXCHANGE.

Please name the final version of your power point slides exactly as
indicated below:

Make sure
that every slide appropriately credits sources, be it an interview,
printed material, or web site. Printed material should be referenced with
Author, Year, Title, Journal (if appropriate), Volume, Number, and page
numbers. For example:

You may not copy directly from sources unless you indent
the text and put it in quotes.This
would normally be reserved for a few sentences of specific quotations.

You must RE-WORD sources!You are using external references as
INPUT to your originally created OUTPUT.

Professor takes plagiarism very seriously and any student
who copies directly from the web or printed sources will be turned over to
Academic Affairs.

I am very happy to work with groups on their specific
topic. I strongly suggest that I meet with your groups several
times.At a MINIMUM, I want to review your power point slides at least a week
before your presentation. Please feel free to email me to make an
appointment in person, or we can do it over the phone or online as well.

Advice for Oral Group
Presentation:

My aim is to have the
best possible group presentations.Based on vast experience with group assignments, keys to success
include:

·As soon
as groups are assigned, sit next to each other in class to foster communication
and relationship building.

·Exchange
contact information.

·Start
your group project as soon as groups are assigned.

·Start
exploring your topic by gathering general statistics about your topic and start
answering the questions:Why is your
topic important to general managers? How much money do companies spend on your
topic? What are the promised benefits of this topic if properly managed?What are the potential pitfalls if
mis-managed?

·Identify
early the original sources of data you want to collect (interviews, case study
material, original surveys)

·Read
entire syllabus regarding the group project

·Be sure to
get the best, most current, most relevant sources of content available

·Frequently
meet with the professor before or after class or via email

·Frequently
meet with each other

·Treat
each group member with respect.You
will likely be in groups with individuals from different countries and
cultures.View the diversity as an
opportunity to learn about how to work with people from different cultures.
Appreciate that individuals have worthwhile and unique viewpoints and talents that
will enrich the group’s performance.

·Please
do not complain to the professor about group members behind their backs. Your
complaints reflect more on you than on the individual you are complaining
about.If a problem arises, find a way
to discuss the problem directly with the individual.If a serious problem arises that you
have not been able to successfully address with the individual, then make an appointment with me and the entire group with
the sole purpose of finding a successful route forward.

·Have
content completed one week prior to presentation.

·DO NOT
HAVE MORE THAN 50 POWER POINT SLIDES (excluding references).

·Meet
with the professor one week prior to review power point slides.

·Meet
with group to practice oral presentation (this is the only way to get the
timing correct!)

·When
speaking in the front of the class, do not use notes.Your power point slides serve as your
notes.

·When
speaking in front of the class, speak LOUDLY enough for the back row to hear
you clearly.

·When
speaking in the front of the class, do not stand behind the instructor’s
computer station.Stand in front of
the class.

·When
speaking in front of the class, all group members should be standing in the
speaking space, with one person advancing the slides.

·The best
presentations pass control many times among group members.You should not organize the speaking as
four 10-minute, independent speeches.The presentation should be integrated
so that every person speaks several times.

·To form
a cohesive group, do not think that an individual “owns” a certain
part of a presentation.It is quite
natural for one member to gather data and another member may actually present
the data.

·The
audience gets tired and cannot absorb too much information at one time.Groups are more effective when
they deliver less information in a relaxed, effective manner rather than trying
to rush through too much information. Usually, as the group presentation
approaches, groups realize they have too much information!The group should keep the best
content.No individual should feel
bad if the information they collected is not all used.Again, each member needs to abandon the
idea that they “own” content.The content is group owned.

·During
practice sessions, help group mates with their oral communication skills.It does not matter if English is not
your native language!Hundreds of
international students have performed well on their oral presentations. What
matters is that students can be heard (good volume), that students do not read
from notes, that students connect with the audience by asking good questions,
that students stand in front of the audience (not behind the instructor
station), that students are enthusiastic, that students have prepared excellent
content, and that students have practiced out loud with their groups.

·Remember to have about 10 minutes of audience interaction. Do not rely on
“Does anyone have any questions?” to fill up your ten minutes of
class participation.In the
past, students have done very creative things for audience participation
including “Name that Entrepreneur”, a short Jeopardy game, a short
survey, etc.

·BE SURE TO SEE HOW I GRADE THE ORAL
PRESENTATIONS

Oral Group Presentation Grades:

Oral presentations
are graded as a group grade rather than as individual grades.

GROUPS Call Centers; Captive
or Shared Services; Crowdsourcing; Public Opinion: Oral group presentations
will be graded using the following form: oral group
grade form

GROUPS South America
and Africa: Oral group presentations will be graded using the following form: oral group
grade form

Individuals in a
group never contribute the exact equal amounts of time, content, and value. This
often leads to some people feeling they worked more than others, and some
people feeling left out. Usually a leader emerges, one who will hopefully help
find the gifts of each individual. Unfortunately, I cannot effectively
intervene in these matters, and rely on you as adults to ensure that all
members of your group meaningfully contribute to the data gathering,
interviewing, analysis, slide design, and presenting the final project.

All group members will receive the same grade for the
oral presentation, provided that all members agree that each individual made a
significant contribution. If a group member has not meaningfully or fully
participated, I will assume that group member was legitimately distracted by
other life issues such as illness or heavy work travel. I do expect that
members who do not fully participate show their integrity by willingly reducing their percentage of contribution.
It is no shame to not fully participate because of legitimate reasons.It is a great shame to expect other group
members to falsely report contribution percentages.

In order to provide some accountability, albeit
imperfect, I will ask that each group fill in the following form and each group
member must sign it. This form is due on the day of presentation.